Ricks says 20,000 people are using drugs

More than 20,000 people started taking it Eli LillyFoundayo’s GLP-1 pill is in its first few weeks on the market, Lilly CEO Dave Rex told CNBC on Thursday.

The FDA approved the once-daily Fodayo tablet earlier this month, making it the second oral GLP-1 drug after Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy tablet. Investors have been closely tracking the weekly prescriptions for clues on how the rollout is going.

More than 1,000 people start the Foundayo project every day, Rex said in an exclusive interview with CNBC. He said building the brand will take time because it is a new drug that doctors and patients are not familiar with. He contrasted this with the launch of the company’s Zepbound weight-loss injection, which contains the same active ingredient as its existing diabetes drug, Mounjaro, and against Novo’s Wegovy pill, which has the same brand name and active ingredient as the injection.

“So what we’re seeing now is basically organic demand, which is very strong for us,” Rex said.

“This is going to be over quarters, not days, and I’m just asking people to tune in and let us implement it,” Rex said. “I think it’ll be okay.”

More than 80% of people taking Foundayo are new to using GLP-1s, he said.

Rex spoke to CNBC after Eli Lilly reported first-quarter earnings and revenue that easily beat expectations. Due to the timing of the launch, Foundayo was not included in the results.

During the quarter, sales of Mounjaro and Zepbound rose 125% and 80%, respectively.

Eli Lilly is trying to maintain its dominance in the GLP-1 market after the successful launch of its oral drug Novo Nordisk. It accounted for 60.1% of the U.S. obesity and diabetes drug market in the first quarter, versus 39.4% for Novo Nordisk, according to the earnings presentation.